Officer Michael R. Bailey never got to hear the jokes his colleagues worked up to celebrate his upcoming retirement.

"All the old-man jokes were definitely coming his way," said Lt. John Serafini, Bailey's commander on the first watch.

The lieutenant and several other officers joined this morning at the Central District police station in the South Loop to remember a dedicated officer and good friend.

Their testimonials came a day after Bailey, returning home from a shift guarding the home of Mayor Richard Daley, was fatally shot in front of his home in the South Side's Park Manor neighborhood.

The 20-year veteran was less than a month from retirement and was cleaning the windshield of the new Buick sedan he had bought to celebrate when gunmen approached, apparently trying to rob him, police said.

A gunfight broke out and Bailey was fatally wounded. No one was in custody this morning.

Bailey's fellow officers and supervisors were still reeling from his death today. Some grieving officers were allowed to take off the overnight shift.

Bailey had shown few signs of slowing down, applying for overtime shifts three times last month.

When Serafini asked why, Bailey replied, "I'm just dedicated, boss. What can I say?"

Cmdr. Christopher Kennedy struggled to find the words to describe how it felt to lose an officer. "It's a common threat that's shared," he said. "We are all losing people that we need the most.

"The city has really lost a guardian angel," Kennedy said. As for the people who killed Bailey, he added, "They weren't raised."

Bailey "illuminated throughout the building," said Officer Eugene Goldsmith, who served with Bailey for about 15 years.

Goldsmith was among the dozens of officers who gathered at Northwestern Memorial Hospital's emergency room Sunday morning in the hours after the shooting to stand vigil for their fallen brother-in-arms.

"To see him laid out like that was devastation," he said.

Mayor Richard M. Daley, at a bill signing on the South Side to increase penalties for unlawful gun possession, he had "the privilege of knowing [Bailey] as he guarded my house, seeing him in the morning or at different shifts. And he looked forward to retiring. He was a good father. He loved the police department. He dedicated his life to serving the people of Chicago. Of course he loved his car. He talked about it, and he was a very, very kind and considerate man who wore the uniform with pride, and we are very saddened for his family and for the people of the city of Chicago.

"Again, this is an example of too many guns in our society," the mayor continued. "I've said that time and time again. I'm not afraid to say it. We have to take outrage, all of us. Every family member, every parent or loved one have to take this outrage into action and look within their own family, within their own block. . . . . Each and every one of parents have to take responsibility for their children. They have to take responsibility for the adults in their families. This is what's happening -- it's like the breakdown of a family.

"And all of us have to, first of all, be saddened by the loss of anyone, or anyone who's a victim. That's all I can say. He was a wonderful, just a wonderful, guy and it seems like people like him unfortunately become victims of crime."

Gov. Pat Quinn, at the same event, said "we've had a heartbreaking summer.

"We cannot let violence, the epidemic of violence, to overcome us," he said. "I think yesterday's events woke us all up that we must double our efforts to make sure that we, law abiding citizens, prevail."

This attack and the other most recent attack of another uniformed officer in a police station parking lot are nothing short of assassinations. What other thing can it be when someone attacks someone in a police uniform and knowing that person is armed? These scum don't deserve to breathe the same air these officers did.